liquid agent  (2026)

One Channel-Video, loop, 04:31


“Water is the first thing in my imagination…All beginning in water, all ending in water.
Turquoise, aquamarine, deep green, deep blue, ink navy, blue-black verulean water.”
Dionne Brand, A Map to the Door of No Return: Notes on Belonging


The Fir Gorma, (old Irish for Blue Men) are mythical sea creatures that dwell in the north-west of Scotland, the Scottish Hebdrides. When ships try to traverse these parts of the sea, they are subjugated to the trial of the Blue Men: Answer their lyrical riddles truthfully and you shall pass. Lie, cheat or try to attack them and the vessel will be pulled down to the bottom of the ocean.
Several folklorists place the origin of this myth in the 9th century. At the time vikings travelled to the north of Africa and abducted several individuals of the continent, bringing them as slaves to the isles. Due to their indigo dyed garments which further colored their skin with a deep blue hue, they were called Blue Men.

Set against the backdrop of this myth, liquid agent proposes how migrant bodies can reclaim contemporary spaces. The work circulates throughout the topics of agency and the body, questioning how dialogue shapes dynamics of power.
Who has the ability to ask questions? Who has the authority to answer and how does this influence our understanding of hierarchies? Through the interplay of archival material and sound, liquid agent makes the body visible: as a protagonist, a collective, the individual, the antagonist and an entity.

Exhibition view  “It’s never love, it’s always work” at Satellit Pop-Up-Space during the 9th Triennial of Photography
played on a 43 inch screen

©Sergej Hufnagel